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Monday, July 25, 2011

Guest Blogger-Brittany!

Hello! Your blog entry today does not come from Sonya, but from Brittany Kimmet, Sonya’s sister-in-law. I am writing today because last week I started working my way through, and documenting by taking pictures, an awesome cookbook, an ice cream cookbook! Sonya asked if I would like to make a guest post on my week of ice cream making and I of course said yes and am delighted to share with you my experiences!

As I stated above my week of cooking was making ice cream, and not just any ol’ ice cream, but delicious Jeni’s Splendid Ice Cream at Home. If some of you have not heard of Jeni’s then I have to admit you are truly missing out! Jeni’s is a local ice cream shop (that is expanding quickly!) that specializes in artisanal ice cream with all natural and as local as she can get ingredients. She has many signature flavors that are in stores all year long, but then she also makes many different flavors by the season and some pretty crazy concoctions. She just recently came out with a book of her ice cream recipes this past June while we were on vacation and the day after we got back I had the book in my possession. Yes folks, her ice cream is that good.

Having her book was the first step. The second is actually having an ice cream maker machine. Yea, I also bought the book without having something to make it with; again, it’s that good (have I convinced all you non-believers yet? I hope so! If not I’m going to keep trying throughout this post ;) ) But continuing on, I was able to borrow Sonya’s ice cream maker attachment for a Kitchenaid mixer (thank you so much!). So after getting the attachment and a trip to the grocery store I could begin my ice cream making.

In the book (links to the book on amazon and Jeni’s website will be at the bottom of the post) there are, I believe, over 100 recipes, but if you’ve gone to Jeni’s even a few times you will most likely acquire favorites and those are what I went with. I decided on making three different kinds as I had three nights free to do so. My first one was Lemon-Blueberry Yogurt (my favorite), Buckeye State, and The milkiest chocolate in the world.

The book is amazing in that you not only have the recipes for this great ice cream, but the explanations are really easy to follow and at the beginning she gives an overview of all the utensils, pots, pans, etc that you’ll need with pictures included. I could probably spend the whole post talking about how awesome the cookbook is, but you are here to read about me making ice cream so onward! And I do promise that there will be much less words and more pictures for the remainder of the post :)

Lemon-Blueberry Yogurt

This is my favorite and it had the most steps, but still totally worth it! First a blueberry sauce. In hindsight I should have cooked this a little longer to make the blueberries more tender, but it still tasted good.

Then prepping the yogurt by straining it for 6-8 hours for a creamier texture

Almost ready for cooking!

The first day I was much messier/disorganized. It got better as the week went. But not cooler. Did I mention I decided to do this during a week when the heat index was over 100 on most days? Well I did. You would think this wouldn’t be a problem for making ice cream . Ice cream is cold, but to make it you must cook it over a stove. This = hot, hot, hot in my apartment. Ah well I survived J

Cooking the cream mixture with lemon jest.

Cooling the yogurt off before putting it in the ice cream machine (~30 minutes)

Freezing the yogurt! (again takes 25-30 minutes)

After the mixing is done you layer the yogurt with the blueberry sauce and voila!

:) mmmm . The main issue here was the heat, because all the sauce sank to the bottom, but it still tastes good!

I made Buckeye State the next day ….

And on Sunday I made the Chocolate ice cream.

The final product! I had about a week and also the help of others to go through the other two flavors (they’re in pint containers), although I could probably do that much damage on my own :)

Each batch made about a quart which for myself is most definitely plenty of ice cream! I’m taking a little break from ice cream making now with my class load increasing this week and studying for the GRE, but I already can’t wait to make my next batch/flavor!

I hope you enjoyed my journey of ice cream making. Below I added the links to Jeni’s website along with the link to amazon for her book. Her ice cream can be shipped all over the U.S. and quite a few specialty stores are carrying pints of it as well. My sister in D.C. is able to find it around her, but I’m not exactly sure which stores she goes to. The ice cream is a tad on the expensive side, but I honestly believe that with one taste you’ll feel it’s worth it. I sure did!

3 comments:

Anytime! And I see a typo that I even looked at earlier and deemed correct, ha. But I used the lemon peel for lemon zest** not lemon jest. Any questions about the ice cream or recipes just let me know :)

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Welcome!

Welcome to our blog! This is a place were we share our adventures with friends, family and you.

Sonya, the blog's main contributor, is a new mommy to baby Henry (born Jan. 31, 2013) and full-time medical territory manager who enjoys baking, sewing, crafting and working out...when she's not spending time with Chris, Henry and their two dogs, Max and Lila and exploring our new home in the Cleveland area.

Chris, sporadic contributor, is a new father, a former Army Captain and MBA graduate of the Fisher College of Business at The Ohio State University. He now works full-time in marketing at a specialty chemical company in NE Ohio. His interests include riding his Harley, OSU football, cross-fit and spending time with his family.